


these fragile breaths

by orphan_account



Category: Les Misérables (2012)
Genre: Canon Era, Canonical Character Death, Comforting, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-12
Updated: 2013-05-12
Packaged: 2017-12-11 16:58:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/801005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is their final night, and yet he still can’t find the words to tell him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	these fragile breaths

The girl is fragile in Combeferre’s arms, her form horrifically skinny and soaking with the rain that heralds their bitter victory. Victory it can hardly be called, seasoned as it is with the harsh sting of the nameless young woman’s loss, and the bitterness of it surges in Joly’s stomach, biting at the back of his lungs and threatening them to heave, to pitch and retch as he even begins to fathom the full extent of what’s ahead of them. They’ve gone through too much already, far too much, with this frail being gone and others soon to follow, and he doesn’t _want_ it, doesn’t want to have to endure the inevitable agony of losing everything that he’s ever dared to treasure.

Musichetta is safe, and perhaps that’s the only thing keeping him afloat at all, for it seems as if every other broken little aspect of his life that he’s ever dared to treasure is locked and buried here, firmly cemented in the trembling foundation of the barricade sure to become their communal tombstone. He could save himself, perhaps—he knows that Enjolras would force nothing out of him; perhaps disdain him for perceived cowardice, but nothing harsher than that. Yet his own survival would do nothing. Somehow, in the midst of it all, his very life has been rendered irrelevant—dimmed, it would seem, in the shadows of others.

Others like Bossuet, of course, darling Bossuet; others like joyous Courfeyrac and melancholy Prouvaire and riotous Bahorel, embittered Grantaire, resolute Enjolras.

Others like Combeferre, the one whom, surely, cannot be encompassed in any single word.

Joly does not know what Combeferre has become to him—whether whatever connection they do shakily maintain is unnatural or unhealthy or unrequited. Perhaps all three, and yet even that triple damnation isn’t enough for him to feel any sort of regret as his eyes follow the blonde man’s movement away from the rest of the group, the dead woman’s body held close to his chest as he makes his way off to place her with the rest of the bodies, with the equally anonymous soldiers who have no one to honor their selfless sacrifice. The mere sight of his departure, however temporary, causes a faint squeeze of something indescribable behind Joly’s ribs, an aching twist in a part of his heart that seems to be none of the chambers he’s studied so meticulously, but rather a new level in and of itself.

It’s an urge, he supposes—a desperate urge that clasps his insides in its relentless desperation. An urge for whatever it is that Combeferre provides so ceaselessly for him; comfort, yes, but more than that. Joly harbors a shivering need for their guide’s subdued smile, for his light touches and his strong voice and his wise words and everything that makes him who he is. And the threat of death, so pressingly prominent within his battle-scorched mind, has brought it to the surface, so that it now fills and encompasses him, leaving room for not a thought in his head but the one that drives him to his feet now, hands only slightly lingering on the broken wooden beams on which he has been sitting all this time.

His legs are numb underneath him, and he struggles to keep his mind suspended in that blinding blankness as he stumbles over the fragmented base of the barricade, ignoring the soft sounds of surprise from those others who do care to spare him their glances and their concern. Thankfully, few do, and so it’s with no objections that he finds himself making his way around the edge of the café, his head lowered simply so that he doesn’t have to meet any of their gazes. They probably suspect that he’s leaving solely for his own reasons, because he desires privacy for whatever reason best fits their image of him, when it genuinely is the perfect opposite.

He needs to tell him.

He has no idea what it is that he so desperately needs to communicate, but even if it’s not formed into proper words, it still burns in his lungs and his chest, suffocating him until he can release it. His head pounds with the proximity of their mutual destruction, and perhaps it’s some sort of anxiety that’s hitching so severely within him, a temporal affliction that he should be genuinely worried about, yet he can’t spare the second required to slow down, to let himself breathe or allow his pulse to sink below the spectacularly accelerated rate that it’s somehow leapt to. It’s only the faintest of reliefs when he rounds the corner of the café and feels the respite of no eyes on his back; escape from the others’ curiosity only means that he’s closer to the very thing causing such nervousness to dampen his palms and dry his mouth.

Combeferre is sitting, swathed in the purpling shadows of the pale dusk. His head is bowed, his hands folded as he regards the woman lying before him. He’s arranged her into a more agreeable position—rather than the broken slump that she’d fallen into previously, she is settled now as though she might be asleep, dripping brunette strands of hair combed neatly out of her blank face. It’s with a quiet sorrow that he regards her, a careful blend of regret and apology, and Joly feels a sudden jerk of unsureness radiate through him; perhaps this is a personal moment, and he shouldn’t be intruding at all.

Somehow, he finds himself talking anyways.

“Do you... did you know her?”

Combeferre makes no movement to indicate his shock; only sighs, the motion gracing his shoulders in a smooth surge that cinches like an iron chain around Joly’s chest and stomach. “I was not acquainted with her myself. Her name, however—did you hear Marius? Her name was Éponine.”

Éponine. Combeferre says nothing more, yet the sharpness, the _reality_ of her having a name hits Joly like a punch, for it carries with it a thousand other implications—if she had a name, then she had a life, then she had hopes and daydreams and a family and perhaps even her own friends, her own loves. They have died with her. She is empty now, erased, vanished, and the world is that much darker with her light extinguished. She was the first to fall upon the barricade, only the first out of so, so many yet to come, and that must be what shades Combeferre’s mind now, what causes him to regard her with such soft distress. Legions more is on the verge of being lost. Here they are, young, foolish men with an impossible hope keeping them afloat, and they’re barreling inevitably into their own destruction.

He struggles to inhale. Combeferre’s hunched form burns before him, breath causing the slight rise and fall of his back, and even that miniscule movement is so precious; Joly would be content, or near enough to content, to merely sit here and absorb the other’s presence, let it soothe him as if it were some guarantee of a real tomorrow, when really it only emphasizes the opposite, paints it out in merciless stark detail. Seeing Combeferre alive now is a reminder that he will see Combeferre dead come sunlight, and that is too much for him, yet there’s no way to turn away, none at all. He still has to say it. Has to find, somewhere within him, the necessary words; and he finds himself heavily envying Prouvaire, wishing he was so easily capable of stringing together sounds that could begin to frame the whirlwind of emotions pulsating through his core, driving him, dominating him.

“You could leave,” he blurts, throat burning, “if you wished. Enjolras would not withhold you.”

Courfeyrac would laugh, however bitterly. Bossuet would sigh, and Grantaire would snort at the absurdity of such a statement. Combeferre does none. Rather, he turns, his lips pressed into something close to an empty smile as he rises from Éponine’s still form, regards Joly in such a gentle way that the medic feels his insides twisting and weakening, melted under the overwhelmingly rueful warmth of that steady gaze.

“I could not. None of us can. You are just as aware of that as the rest.”

He forces his eyes shut to suspend the burn within them, and turns, briefly, half-ready to leave—for surely this is all he’s come for, and there’s nothing to say now that he knows he can’t possibly win. Yet the nameless ache still surges within him, and he finds his jaw shaking, has to grind his teeth tight to force himself from falling apart at the seams. He wants to reach out. He wants to take Combeferre by the shirtfront and sink to his knees and beg, beg as if there is no God, implore that he save himself, for Joly cannot possibly imagine how any sort of planet would be capable of spinning on without him. It is a waste, a waste, a _waste,_ and he feels that so vividly, so unforgivingly, that it leaves no room for breath. And he’s trembling now, making a right fool of himself like he always seems to, he’s never been anything but useless and he feels that now with more ruthless insistence than ever, for he can’t even do this, can’t do more than weakly, pathetically implore that the light of his damned life at least escape the shadows of their accursed barricade...

A soft touch on his shoulder disturbs his blind hurricane of self-spite, and he shivers, letting his eyes open again but lowering them to the ground, staring into the scuffed, dusty earth as though he could bore through it with the raw power of his desperation, find them an escape to another world. Somehow, without lifting even the slightest whisper of noise, Combeferre is beside him, and a hand is running around the back of his neck, fingers brushing the base of his hair, not quite a pat and not quite a caress.

“It’s alright,” he breathes, words closer to Joly’s ear than he imagined, and he stiffens, though the instinctive reaction is returned only by the warm hand running down his back, over and over, until his tight muscles begin to relax. He lets out his own small sigh, chin lowering. and the heat surges behind his eyes more powerfully than ever, stinging furiously. As if the little gust of air was his last effort, he finds himself no longer able to breathe, and yet there is no need to, either. They are close, closer than they have ever been, and that tiny fact launches him into a swirling unreality where air is far from essential.

“It is not.” He tries to swallow, but his throat is too thick, and he releases a ragged whimper instead. “How could it be?”

“I want this. Every one of us wants this, or we would not be here. Surely it must be better to die a hero than to live a slave.”

“I don’t want to die. I don’t want _you_ to die.” He is sickened, deep inside, because it is the plainest way he could have phrased it, and he knows that the rawness of his sincerity fuels the words, draws them into horrible emphasis. He is like a frightened child, and only further detests himself for such, but he cannot stop, not now.

Éponine is forgotten as Combeferre’s other arm moves to wrap around Joly’s back, each movement still perfectly calm, and draws him in, until he feels his forehead pressed into the stiff fabric of the other man’s pale blue waistcoat, and it’s only then, with the warmth surrounding him so fully, that he breaks and the tears come, spilling over with an earnest fluidity that surprises even him. Combeferre surely feels the bite of the liquid, but he does nothing, only holds him tighter, nuzzles down until his lips are pressing against Joly’s flushed forehead, the touch more reassuring than any words could be.

“None of us _want_ to die,” Combeferre muses after a few unsteady moments. “Save perhaps Enjolras. I am quite sure he could dream up no higher honor.”

“Definitely not.” Joly sniffs and swallows, and light fingers peruse his hair, sending chills through his core with their hushed movements.

“I am as afraid as you are. All of us are, and that is what makes us strong. Surely death cannot hold anything worse than the despair that our nation has been drowned in. It will be a relief, perhaps, for some of them. It strikes me that Grantaire, particularly, is nothing but weary by now.”

“Are you... weary?”

“As I said, I do not wish to die. And the prospect does frighten me. Yet I cannot doubt the fact that our actions are entirely necessary, in the scheme of things, if you will. To die is only a fearful idea, I believe, because there is nothing to hold onto. It is a horrific space to enter alone, for it lacks even a trace of familiarity.”

“And yet everyone enters it alone,” he gets out, tasting salt.

A pause, a slight tension. Then the hands shift to his shoulders, push him slowly back and move up to cup his trembling jaw and frame his face on either side. He blinks, the tears catching in his lashes, and makes out blue eyes gazing into him, heart-wrenching in their steady mildness.

“If it serves as any sort of help,” Combeferre murmurs, his thumb moving to press away the heaviest of the tear trails staining Joly’s reddened cheeks, “you will not have to. Might it do anything to ease the inevitable, I will remain by your side.”

He’s crying harder than ever, now; disintegrating because he doesn’t know what to say or think or feel, knows only that he wants this, that he needs this, and can’t bear the reality of his unwilling demand. But he nods, swiftly, presses his lips together and heaves a scorching breath and blinks furiously to clear away the blur of the moisture still swelling insistently. “Until the end?” he stammers, and he realizes for the first time that his arms have somehow found their way around Combeferre’s waist, that they’re holding onto each other with equal tightness.

“The very end. I promise.”

His legs give out all at once, but Combeferre only clutches him with even more determined strength, gathering Joly fully up to him, holding him together as he falls apart. “I’m sorry,” Joly is gasping, hating himself more with every repetition and yet unable to stop, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for.”

It occurs to him in that instant that he probably loves this man, and the revelation is so simple, so pure and obvious and perfect, that he finds himself smiling even as he sobs, tenderness sighing through him, simultaneously empowering and weakening. For an isolated infinity, they only hold onto each other, and nothing needs to be said.

* * *

 

When Grantaire sings, his voice low and yet subtly ablaze with the impending loss that weighs down on him so heavily, they sit together. Combeferre’s fingers trace Joly’s shoulder blades, and Joly keeps his head down, watches his own hands twist together to filter the fear that still rages within him. The fact that Combeferre is here does not lessen that fear, but it soothes it, reminds him that the terror does not have to dominate him in total.

And they all look so tired, Prouvaire’s eyes downcast and Courfeyrac’s usual grin nowhere in sight. They can sigh together of friendship and hope, but they know that the soldiers are readying their rifles somewhere, and that shared understanding is what binds them together more fully than anything else. They are entering the rift as a single entity, and yet each is isolated unto himself, immured in mournful contemplation, perhaps thoughts of Éponine, or otherwise concern for themselves, for each other.

It is the last night, and yet somehow Joly can almost smile.

He is afraid, but he is not alone.

* * *

 

The sun rises after sleepless hours, and when the soldiers come, his lungs convulse again. He’s choking and stumbling as he sees them fall, as Bahorel is cut down and Feuilly is torn to the ground and Prouvaire vanishes somewhere in the clouds of smoke. Everything is burning and bitter, and he keeps shooting until his own gun is knocked away from his hand and then all he can do is gasp, fill his lungs as though the basic function made to keep  him alive can do just that, suspend his death from its inevitable approach. The shivering peace of the previous night is lost in dawn’s red glow, and his eyes ache, poisoned with dust and saturated with terror.

His blood is roiling, his silence screaming.

_Where are you?_

And it feels wrong, because this is so massive, because there’s gunfire everywhere and some of them are shouting and yet that’s _all;_ there is nothing to dramatize or romanticize any aspect of the mutiny that’s ripping his friends apart. It is so _real,_ and, in being so, nightmarish. The fighting is barbaric in its starkness, and barbarism terrifies him like nothing else. He is stranded amidst chaos.

Then there is an arm around his shoulder, a hand gripping his shirtfront and another at his shoulder, turning him as his eyes water from the brightness of the flashing muskets. A half-shout finds its way to his ear— _“Go, Joly, move!”—_ louder than Combeferre has ever addressed him before, and the urgency ignites within him, so that he’s stumbling forwards, guided only by the other man’s strong grip. Somehow, it’s only a few more surging instants before he’s inside, and the wooden walls around him are frail protection but protection all the same—yet they don’t stop there, for Combeferre is forcing him on, his own hands shaking with adrenaline, and it’s not until they’ve somehow made their way up a flight of stairs that Joly finally gets his bearings properly.

There are four of them, all breathing heavily, staring about as though they can’t quite comprehend they’ve gotten this far. Beside himself and Combeferre stands Courfeyrac, and then Enjolras, and he wonders with an aching pang whether this is it, whether they’re the last ones left. Other faces flash behind his eyes, those of the ones whom he didn’t see fall, of Bossuet and Grantaire, but there’s no time to contemplate if they’re still alive, because this is it. There’s nowhere to go from here.

The overwhelming nearness of the end suddenly rushes up inside of him, and he exhales swiftly, a wave of dizziness throbbing through his skull and greying out the world before him. He half-stumbles, but then there’s pressure around him; Combeferre is holding him up, gripping his forearm, providing the strongest anchor he could possibly have desired. The previous night’s words rush back— _the very end, I promise—_ and his ears are ringing as he reaches up, winds his own fingers as tightly as possible into the loose fabric of Combeferre’s shirt, clinging to him with every scrap of his remaining strength.

_The very end._

_I promise._

The air catches fire around and within him, and they are still holding each other as they fall.

* * *

 

They stand together on the sunlit barricade.

The ruins of the weaker world are left behind, and he thinks, with the flag in his hands and the song at his throat and the warmth at his side, that perhaps he need never have feared for an instant.

 


End file.
